Learning lessons from Denmark

The Scottish Government recognises that we need to get fossil fuels out of our energy system and a transition to renewables.

Scotland plays a leading role in ensuring that this transition goes beyond switching fuels by supporting the development of local economies that enable people’s ownership of our energy system.

The SNP made a clear manifesto commitment to increase the target for community and locally-owned energy from 500MW to 1GW by 2020 and to double it again to 2GW by 2030.

However, there is a long way to go before this people-centred, distributed energy will become normalised.

For example, the Scottish Government supports the uptake of onshore shared-ownership projects that benefit developers and communities alike.

Yet vast amounts of Scottish renewable potential lies offfshore and we need to ensure that communities also have a stake in these projects.

There are lessons to be learnt from countries such as Denmark, where local authorities play a bigger role in delivering energy solutions and where communities have part or wholly-owned large offshore developments since 2000.

Finally, we need to see a much more integrated approach to energy that links electricity, heating, transport and spatial planning to get us on the path to a fossil-free Scotland.